Tuesday, June 16, 2009

BG cut her first tooth

I was changing her diaper and she was giving me one of her usual toothy grins when I looked and saw a little glimmer of white protrude out of her top gum.

It's the top right tooth.

So far, she seems unphased.

She has been drinking more breast milk recently. I took it as the weather getting warmer and her being more mobile increasing thirst but maybe she's going through a growth spurt.

Ok, parents, have you ever gotten so tired watching your kid that you could use a nap? Have you ever tried to get your child to nap and you've been up for so long exerting all this energy to get this active child to sleep that you wind up dozing for a few minutes while he/she is crawling here and there? Well, DH and I are in that zone.

I swear the person the wrote this cartoon, Greedy for Tweety, has been there because every time I feel my lids get heavy, I think of this cartoon and that scene with Sylvester the Cat, the Dog, no one knows the name of, and the baseball bat (2:51).

Except in my case, the cat is me, the dog is my baby crawling towards the baseball bat which is something I forgotten to child proof, like my laptop or phone.

My husband calls it a time warp. "I swear, it's like time moved and she's crawling down the hallway when two seconds ago she was sitting next to me playing."

I've been reading up on toddlerhood and what to expect during the lovely ages of 2-4. From what I've read, I need to prepare for a marathon and a debate. It's making me a little nervous and sad that the 'easy' year is behind us. I laugh at 'easy' as reading back on the my little blurbs, I recall the stress, changes, uncertainty that new parenthood and a newborn brings.

I think my heart will break into a thousand pieces when the first major tantrum and first 'No!' happens. According to some of the moms I've spoken to, there are two approaches to impending toddlerhood, the fight for independance: denial (My child will never do that) and shelter building.

i'm too logical, or superstitous, to be in denial. I think I'm slowly preparing the sandbags in my bunker.

Aside from the tooth we've also had some other milestones. BG touched beach sand for the first time. Ok, it wasn't a real beach, it was the man made beach at the Seaport but still it was beach sand. She was apprehensive and left without a true opinion of sand. The parents on the other hand discovered, even if you only allow a child to put their feet and hands in the sand, it will somehow get in their diaper.

BG also stood up and 'drove' the parked car. She loved waving at me while I stood in front of the car.

It's not really a milestone and she's had mosquito bites before but BG got attacked by a family of mosquitos. She went out with DH to the park and came back with welts all over her knuckles and face. The poor girl still has the red marks all over her face.

BG is also pushing herself up to standing by herself and testing the waters as I've caught her letting go of whatever she's holding on to for brief seconds and standing by herself.

It's true what they say, as soon as they learn they can crawl, their standing and cruising.

We've been babyproofing bit by bit as we're seeing how inquisitive our little girl is. So far, she's into closing cabinets and dresser drawer knobs. We've budgeted for more expensive, sturdy gates but opted out of expensive drawer appliances. We heard totlocks are good but DH says that his brain can't recall where he put his keys and that unless we had 20 totlock keys, he'd always lose it. So we bought a few of the hook kinds but haven't set them up yet. Right now we have painters tape, which is doing a surprisingly good job holding the drawers closed.

We know in a few weeks this is not going to be good enough as BG has already figured out the mechanics of some items.

Right now, we're debating the beach. I'd love for her to experience the beach but I think she's still too young to warrant the outing. For us a trip to the beach means packing the car and driving and enduring the traffic (which is what I dread the most) for a few hours of me chasing my husband to put sunscreen on the baby. Still, she loves the water so I'm researching beaches in the area and looking for a beach that is clean, family friendly, not too far and not too crowded that the traffic increase travel time 2 fold.